Battle of Olivento

The Battle of Olivento was fought on 17 March 1041 between the armies of the Byzantine Empire and the Norman-led Lombard rebel army under William Iron Arm.

In 1035, the Norman lord Tancred of Hauteville and his eight sons arrived in southern Italy, and the House of Hauteville became one of the most influential factions in Italy. In 1038, the Byzantines launched a disastrous military expedition against Muslim Sicily, and, by 1041, the Byzantines' Lombard subjects were once again rebelling against their rule, this time in Policoro. The Normans rode into Apulia to fight with their Latin cousins, and Tancred's son William Iron Arm led a combined Norman-Lombard army against the Byzantines at the Olivento River. The elite Varangian Guard under the exiled Norwegian prince Harald Hardrada fought for the Byzantines, but the Varangians were unable to hold out against the Norman heavy cavalry and were defeated. The Normans followed up their victory at Olivento with another victory at Montemaggiore, only for the Normans to betray their Lombard allies and seize sizable portions of Apulia and Calabria for themselves by 1047, organizing the County of Melfi with the recognition of Count Guaimar IV of Salerno and the Holy Roman Emperor.